"Flat, Dull Evangelicalism"

It is no longer a new story that the Crystal Cathedral has filed for bankruptcy. What does this tell us about religion in the US, particularly evangelicalism?

Check out this devastating article.

In the US, where school psychologists are almost as common as school nurses, we are obsessed with talk therapies because they are in fact ecumenical and secularised versions of evangelical Christianity, our old time religion. Twelve-step programmes, beginning with Alcoholics Anonymous, appropriated the conversion scenario of revivalism, eliminating references to Jesus in favour of appeals to a generic "higher power". Later self-help programmes and therapies dispensed with supernatural intermediaries altogether. Learning the right tricks and gimmicks, thinking the right thoughts and acquiring the proper attitudes would directly, by a law of nature, make good things happen for you.

Schuller, Warren and other new-style evangelical preachers, who focus on this-worldly improvement rather than otherworldly salvation, have not sold out Christianity in favour of secular self-help. They have simply reappropriated those bits of evangelical Christianity that cycled through the secularisation process and emerged as therapies, having in the process acquired the veneer of science.

So if you wonder why Americans are, anomalously, religious it is because we have evacuated religion of all content. There are of course theological doctrines on the books, which church members tick off, in the way that they agree to accept screenfuls of conditions for installing new software. But most have no serious interest in these theoretical matters. Whether signing on for a new therapy or self-help programme, trying out a new diet or a new church, they are looking for a bag of tricks, a collection of gimmicks and recipes that will get them the material prosperity, perfect health, beautiful bodies, ideal relationships and complete happiness to which they believe they are entitled.

I never understood the appeal of these programmes, whether religious or secular: they claimed to produce plain empirical results but were never empirically confirmed. For all the cheerful platitudes and possibility thinking, the Crystal Cathedral was bankrupt.

Beyond that, as a religious believer I was disheartened. Was this all religion was: Cheerful platitudes and advice for successful living? Recipes for doing well in this world and the next? A pleasant place to pass an hour or two: an uplifting programme, brunch in the Welcoming Center and a stroll through the grounds?

I thought religion was a window into heaven, into another world of power, glory and intensity, to the contemplation of divine beauty. When I got religion, I never imagined this flat, dull evangelicalism.

The Christianity of the Future?

"When a church doesn't take itself seriously, neither do its members. It is hard to believe that as recently as 1960, members of mainline churches (Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans and the like) accounted for 40% of all American Protestants. Today, it's more like 12% (17 million out of 135 million). Some of the precipitous decline is due to lower birthrates among the generally blue-state mainliners, but it also is clear that millions of mainline adherents (and especially their children) have simply walked out of the pews never to return. According to the Hartford Institute for Religious Research, in 1965, there were 3.4 million Episcopalians; now, there are 2.3 million. The number of Presbyterians fell from 4.3 million in 1965 to 2.5 million today. Compare that with 16 million members reported by the Southern Baptists.

"When your religion says "whatever" on doctrinal matters, regards Jesus as just another wise teacher, refuses on principle to evangelize and lets you do pretty much what you want, it's a short step to deciding that one of the things you don't want to do is get up on Sunday morning and go to church.

"It doesn't help matters that the mainline churches were pioneers in ordaining women to the clergy, to the point that 25% of all Episcopal priests these days are female, as are 29% of all Presbyterian [PCUSA] pastors, according to the two churches. A causal connection between a critical mass of female clergy and a mass exodus from the churches, especially among men, would be difficult to establish, but is it entirely a coincidence? Sociologist Rodney Stark ("The Rise of Christianity") and historian Philip Jenkins ("The Next Christendom") contend that the more demands, ethical and doctrinal, that a faith places upon its adherents, the deeper the adherents' commitment to that faith. Evangelical and Pentecostal churches, which preach biblical morality, have no trouble saying that Jesus is Lord, and they generally eschew women's ordination. The churches are growing robustly, both in the United States and around the world.
"Despite the fact that median Sunday attendance at Episcopal churches is 80 worshipers, the Episcopal Church, as a whole, is financially equipped to carry on for some time, thanks to its inventory of vintage real estate and huge endowments left over from the days (no more!) when it was the Republican Party at prayer. Furthermore, it has offset some of its demographic losses by attracting disaffected liberal Catholics and gays and lesbians.

". . . As for the rest of the Episcopalians, the phrase "deck chairs on the Titanic" comes to mind.
"So this is the liberal Christianity that was supposed to be the Christianity of the future: disarray, schism, rapidly falling numbers of adherents, a collapse of Christology and national meetings that rival those of the Modern Language Assn. for their potential for cheap laughs. And they keep telling the Catholic Church that it had better get with the liberal program (ordain women, bless gay unions and so forth) or die. Sure."

- From a Los Angeles Times article by Charlotte Allen (Catholicism editor for Beliefnet)

Is it possible to be too Gospel-centered?

I remember about ten years ago hearing for the first time from C.J. Mahaney a vision for the Christian life and the church that was "Gospel-centered." It was like a conversion experience for me. I knew that I would never think of the church and Christianity in the same way ever again. About that same time I discovered Mark Dever's 9 Marks Ministries. As a young Southern Baptist pastor I was profoundly encouraged to hear from another SBC pastor who was declaring this same vision of Gospel-centeredness.

Briefly, to be Gospel-centered is to understand that the message of Christ's perfect obedience, substitutionary death, and victorious resurrection is the theological well spring and functional center of the Christian life and the church.

It seems like a no-brainer. And yet for many of us who grew up in conservative evangelicalism the Gospel was thought of simply as the abc's or something attached to evangelism. We loved the Gospel but it was a piece of the whole, not the central reality. I had never been given a vision of the Gospel as the very center of my life. What made the message so powerful (and as it turns out, lasting) is that it is biblical. A vision of the Gospel-centered life is the vision God gives us in His Word. For a man who had grown up in the never ending ebb and flow of evangelical fads, this was different. This wasn't higher life. It wasn't seeker sensitive. It wasn't purpose driven. This was not about prophecy seminars, power point, or vision statements.

Gospel-centeredness, I came to see, is a rock-ribbed, biblical vision for God's people. The Gospel illuminates the grand narrative of Scripture. The Gospel is the great theme for preaching. The Gospel is God's power for our efforts to evangelize. It is reality that brings wholeness to our brokenness. The Gospel provides the only satisfying rationale for Christ-like ethics like mercy and sacrifice. It is no wonder why Paul calls this message of the doing, dying, and rising of Christ "the matter of first importance" (1 Cor 15:3).

Dane Ortland has a helpful post addressing whether or not "Gospel-centered" is merely a fad.

There has been a wave of books, blogs, messages and movements in recent years calling, in various ways, for the church today to be (more) ‘gospel-centered.’

Publically, I think of Ray Ortlund, Zack Eswine, Tim Keller, Sovereign Grace, Acts 29, the Gospel Coalition, Jared Wilson, Joe Thorn, Jonathan Dodson, Paul Tripp, David Powlison, Jerry Bridges, Mike Bullmore, D. A. Carson, Graeme Goldsworthy, Covenant Seminary, Tullian Tchividjian, and many others (see e.g., here). Privately, I think of friends like Brian Martin, Nate Conrad, Dan Orr, and Jim Lane, who have personally helped me understand the gospel as the engine (keeping us going), not the runway (getting us off the ground at conversion and landing us in heaven at death but unnecessary in between), to life and theology.

In more recent days, though, some are raising the question of whether this is getting a bit out of hand, asking whether we can emphasize the gospel to the exclusion of other things, and, perhaps most of all, simply expressing a general cynicism about the current trendiness of being gospel-centered (whatever “gospel-centered” means — I use the phrase here to refer to viewing the gospel not as something beyond which Christians graduate but which rather remains the heartbeat of life, to be not only confessed doctrinally and evangelistically but also appropriated emotionally and psychologically, the non-negotiable of all non-negotiables, summed up best biblically in 1 Cor 15:3-4).

There are three possible responses to the current trendiness of being ‘gospel-centered.’

1.Uncritically dismiss it due to its trendiness
2.Uncritically absorb it due to its being embraced by others we know or respect; vicariously feed on others’ excitement without personally digesting it ourselves
3.Consider what it means, and whether it is biblical; ponder what istrue in it; ask why it is trendy.

The last option is the way of wisdom. Before either dismissing it or absorbing it, let’s consider it, test it, and, if we find that in fact deeper awareness of sin and sin’s healing in Christ is indeed the place to start and end every day happily and humbly, pass it on.

Remember, trendiness is not bad in itself. Justification by faith alone was suddenly trendy among significant church circles in the 1520s and 30s. Thank the Lord for all those who neither uncritically dismissed it nor uncritically absorbed it but personally wrestled with it, saw it in their Bibles, found fresh liberation, and passed it on.

What you win them with you win them to...

I can identify with the title of Jared Wilson's latest post over at First Things: "Six Flags Over Jesus." As a born and bred Texan I am well familiar with that statement. In Texas, your church is big or it ain't nothin! Okay, so I may be exagerating a little; but only a little. If you think you've seen a big church in the northeast then all I can say is, "You ain't seen nothin' yet." Go to Houston. Go to Dallas. You will be amazed by the size of many of the churches. The facilities with coffee shops and book stores and fountains begin, in some cases to resemble a mall more than a place of worship and instruction in God's Word. I'm not against large churhes. I pastor, by northeastern standards a large church. But compared to my Texas bretheren we are definitely small potatoes.

In Nashville, the people might think your small church is cute but in Houston they will tell you it is, as if this is a compliment and not a condescension. The second pastor I was a youth minister for planted his church in 1995 in Houston. He’s been there 15 years now with a regular attendance of about 100 for the last decade, and our mutual friends consider this as “Hanging in there.” As if 15 years of existence with 100 people constitutes the verge of death.

This isn’t just a Texas problem, but it is a Texas-sized problem in evangelicalism. Enter First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas and their new $130 million building campaign. Normally I don’t give one whit about how much a pastor is being paid or how much a church spends on whatever; I get my ire raised more by other things. And what FBC Dallas is doing doesn’t really raise my ire. But it is reflective of something that, yes, is bigger than FBC Dallas, bigger than $130 million.

Do we even know what $130 million looks like? Well, we do, actually. It looks like this.

What is at stake is what church is. In the building Q&A linked above, we find this gem: “[T]he glass walls have an evangelistic effect: people walking by have a view in from the street and feel drawn in.”

In the same way a hobo on the sidewalk might press his face against the window of a fancy restaurant in a Norman Rockwell painting, no doubt.

Read Jared's entire post HERE.

Driven by the Word

Recent research has found some troubling trends in America. One trend that ought to cause us great concern is that since 1991 the number of unchurched in our country has almost doubled. The adult population has grown by 15 percent but the number of adults who do not attend church has risen from 39 million to 75 million. In light of this growing secularism many voices within the church have offered a variety of remedies. Some of the most popular remedies offered have resulted in a diminishing of the Word of God in the pulpits of our churches. We are told that to simply preach expositionally from the Bible is “boring” and “not relevant to the needs of modern Americans.” The result has been a church that is fascinated by fads and captivated by the trendy. We should not be surprised by the growing secularization within the church. We have thrown away the preaching of the Word in favor of “talks” driven by the latest fads in therapy, management, and personal growth. Ironically, by aping cultural trends we have sown the seeds of our own irrelevance. Is it any wonder that statistics show little or no difference between the lifestyles of those who call themselves Christians and those who do not? The remedy is not to be skilled at adopting or even adapting the techniques of the world but rather to once again affirm our reliance upon that which is unchanging.

Perhaps a letter from Bose that explains the superiority of their sound will illustrate my point:
“We strive to reproduce the musical sounds as closely as possible to those of the original performance. And we strive to avoid flashy sounds such as those associated with accentuated bass and/or treble frequencies. While these sounds may be initially attractive to the novice, they are not real and are not enduring.”
I can tell you from personal experience that the “initially attractive” sounds emanating from our culture can be very attractive to a pastor seeking to reach people. But where is our confidence? Do we trust the enduring Word of God? Do we believe that modern Americans are too sophisticated or too shallow to receive God’s Word taught and preached? Sadly, if one were to take a tour of the average evangelical church in America today the signs of the temporal and the flashy would be abundant.

I have often bemoaned the growing consumerist mindset in the church today. “If you want me to come to your church then offer me the goods and services I demand.” Pastors, wanting to preside over a large congregations, easily give in to the demands of parishioners-turned-customers. One recent article I read noted, “When people see themselves as the purpose and center of life, the church becomes a store of sorts where they can shop what the church has to offer and settle on the best value: which church gives the most to me while requiring the least from me?”

I don’t mean to sound simplistic but the remedy for this is found in the Bible. Divinely inspired, unerringly authoritative, and timelessly relevant, the Bible, through the power of the Holy Spirit, provides for the church both the content of our instruction and the measuring rod for our ministries. For the self-absorbed consumerist God’s Word says, “Whoever loses his life for Me (Jesus) will find it.” For the pastor wondering about the relevance of preaching the Bible says, “And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?” For the church wondering about the relevance of the Bible I offer these words from II Timothy 3:16: “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

Contrary to the shallow thinking in much of the church growth movement, the faithful and passionate preaching of God’s Word has great appeal to a generation that has lost its moorings. Our culture’s immersion in technology and the banal has heightened rather than lessened the relevance of a man standing to proclaim: “Thus says the Lord.” The current conditions of our world have made a real flesh and blood person faithfully teaching God’s Word to a small group or Sunday School class as needful as it has ever been. In an age that seems to have no category for a grand, divinely ordered narrative that guides our existence, the need is great for a church who points to a source of authority outside itself. God’s Word must drive our preaching, our teaching, our discipleship, our praying, and our fellowship. I know of no other way to be faithful to our calling to be a city set upon a hill.

Contemporary Preaching's Infatuation with Technology

Yesterday I received from a friend a copy of Al Mohler's new book on preaching - He Is Not Silent. If you are a preacher then do yourself and your congregation a favor and read this book. I have been devouring it. In the opening chapter Mohler makes a point about a current trend in preaching that for many is simply a fresh and effective way to communicate with contemporary audiences. The issue is the use of video and various other images in the preaching event.

Mohler writes:

Contemporary preaching suffers from an infatuation with technology.

The French philosospher Jacques Ellul was truly prophetic when he pointed to the rise of technology and technique as one of the greatest challenges to Christian faithfulness in our times. We live in a day of technological hubris and the ubiquity of technological assistance. We are engaged in few tasks, physical or mental, that are now unassisted by some form of technology. For most of us, the use of these technologies comes with little attentiveness to how the technology reshapes the task and the experience. The same is true for preachers who have rushed to incorporate visual technology and media in the preaching event.

The effort is no doubt well intended, driven by a missiological concern to reach persons whose primary form of 'mental transport' has become visual. Thus, preachers use clips from films, dynamic graphics, and other eye-catching technologies to gain and hold the congregation's attention. But the danger of this approach is seen in the fact that the visual quickly overcomes the verbal. Beyond this, the visual is often directed toward a very narrow slice of human experience, particularly focused on the affective and emotional aspects of our perception. Movies move us by the skillful manipulation of emotion, driven by sound track and manipulated by skillful directing techniques.

This is exactly where the preacher must not go. The power of the Word of God, spoken through the human voice, is seen in the Bible's unique power to penetrate all dimensions of the human personality. As God made clear, even the Ten Commandments, He has chosen to be heard and not seen. The use of visual technologies threatens to confuse this basic fact of biblical faith.

Oh, how I wish this was a parody!

This is just one example of how churches have moved away from faithfully preaching God's Word and keeping the Gospel central to its proclamation. What happens in this type of preaching is that "principles" are presented "from the Bible" that anyone can apply and benefit from. It is the mistaken notion that the Bible is a guidebook for living that will give success regardless of one's relationship to Christ. No wonder so many professing Christians cannot explain the Gospel. No wonder so many Christians cannot responsibly read and interpret the Bible. No wonder our churches are producing so many "happy pagans".

Do pastors truly have to "preach" on what men and women find sexy in order be relevant? What has happened to our reverence for God's Word? What has happened to our reverence for God's presence among His people?

What Music Cannot Do

God has ordained music and singing for the purpose of His praise. The Scriptures are full of exhortations to God’s people to sing and make music for the Lord. This is a blessing. God was gracious when He gave us the means of music that we might use to honor Him. But Scripture is clear that music in our worship is for two purposes: to honor God and to edify our fellow believers. This is important to understand because in the contemporary church, music has been vested with powers that God never bestows upon it.

One example (and there are many) of this misunderstanding of the purpose of music specifically and worship in general comes from the flyer of a recent conference:
Join us for dynamic teaching to set you on the right path, and inspiring worship where you can meet God and receive the energy and love you need to be a mover and shaker in today’s world…Alongside our teaching program are worship events which put you in touch with the power and love of God.

Churches routinely advertise their “life-changing” or “dynamic” worship that will “bring you closer to God” or “change your life.” Certain worship CD’s promise that the music will “enable you to enter the presence of God.” These kinds of promises reveal a dangerous theological error. Worship, i.e. singing, is viewed as a means to facilitate an encounter with God; it will move us closer to God. This is, at best a sub-Christian view. At worst, it is heresy.

Jesus is the only way to God. He is the sole mediator between God and man. The popular but mistaken notions regarding worship music betray this foundational truth of the Christian faith. They offer music and “the worship experience” as an additional mediator between God and man. They would deny this by insisting that they believe Jesus to be the only way to salvation. But they would be hard pressed to find any biblical support for the idea that music mediates direct encounters or experiences with God. This is a common pagan notion. It is far from Christian.
Vaughan Roberts offers four consequences of viewing music as an encounter with God. I will summarize them.[1]

1. God’s Word is marginalized.
In many Churches and Christian gatherings it is not unusual for God’s Word to be shortchanged. Music gives people the elusive “liver quiver” while the Bible is more mundane. But faith does not come from music, dynamic experiences, or supposed encounters with God. Faith is birthed through the means of God’s Word (Rom 10:17).

2. Our assurance is threatened.
If we associate God’s presence with a particular experience or emotion, what happens when we no longer feel it? We search for churches whose praise band, orchestra, or pipe organ produce in us the feelings we are chasing after. But the reality of God in our lives depends on the mediation of Christ not on subjective experiences.

3. Musicians are given priestly status.
When music is seen as a means to encounter God, worship leaders and musicians are vested with a priestly role. They become the ones who bring us into the presence of God rather than Jesus Christ who alone has already fulfilled that role. Understandably, when a worship leader or band doesn’t help me experience God they have failed and must be replaced. On the other hand, when we believe that they have successfully moved us into God’s presence they will attain in our minds a status that is far too high for their own good.

4. Division is increased.
If we identify a feeling as an encounter with God, and only a particular kind of music produces that feeling, then we will insist that same music be played regularly in our church or gatherings. As long as everyone else shares our taste then there is no problem. But if others depend upon a different kind of music to produce the feeling that is important to them then division is cultivated. And because we routinely classify particular feelings as encounters with God our demands for what produce those feelings become very rigid. This is why so many churches succumb to offering multiple styles of worship services. By doing so, they unwittingly sanction division and self-centeredness among the people of God. Like a Burger King customer the church attendee is encouraged to “have it your way.”

[1] Roberts, Vaughn, True Worship (pp. 59ff).

All In The Family

The discouraging statistics regarding young people who leave the church after high school say more about the family, I believe, than about the church. I do think that entertainment/event driven youth ministry ultimately fails in its stated purpose. But, in the end, parents, particularly fathers must answer to the departure of their sons and daughters from the fellowship of God's people.

Jesus the Rock Star

This is an interesting article about the preaching of Tadd Grandstaff pastor of Pine Ridge Church. I think a lot about preaching, corporate worship, and the church. I hope we can agree that it matters what we say about Jesus.

Any thoughts about the rock star stuff?

Soul Winning for Dummies

I found this posted over at Paleoevangelical. Mark Dever read this same passage at the Gospel Growth conference in October. It’s from C.S. Lovett’s little book “Soul Winning Made Easy.” It represents so much of what was wrong in evangelism training in the past. It also raises some important questions about the way many evangelicals understand regeneration and conversion.

“You have just said to your prospect . . . "Jesus is waiting to come into your heart. Will you open the door? Will you let Him come in?" He makes no reply. Great forces are at work inside him. His soul is a battlefield. The Holy Spirit and Satan want his decision. You wish you could jump into his heart and help him, but you can't. So you do the one thing you can do . . . press him to make a decision . . . one way or the other.

“CAUTION: You can't leave him in "no-man's land." The Longer you wait, Satan's advantage increases. So silently start your countdown . . . 5-4-3-2-1. That's it. You wait no longer. Lay your hand on his shoulder (or arm if a man is dealing with a woman) . . . and with a semi-commanding voice say . . . "Bow your head with me."

“Note: Do not look at him when you say this. He won't act if you do. Instead, bow your head first. The sight of your bowed head, the authority in your voice, the touch of your hand on his shoulder and the witness of the Spirit combine to exert terrific pressure. Out of the corner of your eye you will see him look at you with wonder. Then, as his resistance crumbles, his head will come down in jerks. When your hand feels the relaxation of his shoulder, you'll know his heart has yielded.

“Note: If your man is going to say, "NO," he has to do it now. You've brought him to the place of decision under terrific psychological pressure. If he can't bring himself to receive Christ, he'll say to you ... "I can't do it." Then deal with him as you would the person who says, ‘NO.’”

Many of us can’t help but laugh a little at Rev. Lovett’s instructions. However, we see this same sort of “regeneration by technique” repeated often in the church today. The corporate gatherings of God’s people have been transformed into variety shows for bored church shoppers. Evangelism is left up to the professionals on Sundays who, combined with cool stage lighting, props, and hip musicians will convince seekers to “pray the pray” whereupon they will immediately be assured of their eternal salvation. Been there, seen that, and, unfortunately, done that.

Makes Me Wanna Scream!

Okay, so maybe I’m not having the best day. Maybe I’m a little sensitive to these kinds of issues today but reading Michael Horton’s article in this month’s issue of Modern Reformation makes we want to scream.

Horton writes:

"Based on numerous studies conducted by his research group, evangelical pollster George Barna writes: ‘To increasing millions of Americans, God – if we even believe in a supernatural deity – exists for the pleasure of humankind. He resides in the heavenly realm solely for our utility and benefit. Although we are too clever to voice it, we live by the notion that true power is accessed not by looking upward but by turning inward.’ Unless something changes, Barna thinks, ‘it will be very man for himself, with no second thoughts or regrets about the personal or societal implications of this incredibly selfish, nihilistic, narcissistic way of life…

After citing a series of reports, Barna concludes, ‘In short, the spirituality of America is Christian in name only.’

We desire experience more than knowledge. We prefer choices to
absolutes. We embrace preferences rather than truths. We seek
comfort rather than growth. Faith must come on our terms or we reject
it. We have enthroned ourselves as the final arbiters of righteousness,
the ultimate rulers of our own experience and destiny. We are the
Pharisees of the new millennium.

"Barna’s studies suggest that most Americans value time and efficiency over everything else, minimizing long-term commitments, maintaining 'independence and individuality at all costs,' even to the point of being skeptical of institutions, people, and authorities. After all, people are told every day, 'You are unique,' and that they shouldn’t submit to the expectations of others. Above all, 'Trust your feelings to guide you. Relying upon absolute principles places unrealistic limitations on you. Only you know what’s right or best for you at any given moment, in those circumstances.' Finally, 'Set goals and achieve them…Have fun…Stay in good health…Discover and revel in the purpose of your life.' These are the principal values according to Barna’s surveys of American adults today. After expressing alarm at such trends, however, Barna himself advocates a market-driven outlook that reduces the Christian faith and mission to human-centered techniques of pragmatism and consumerism that might even have made Finney blush. There is this huge disconnect between what we say we believe and what we actually seem to believe when the rubber meets the road."

My own experience as a youth pastor and now pastor confirms everything Horton writes. Too many local congregations have been transformed from the body of Christ to a loose coalition of disparate groups who must each be catered to in order to maintain their patronage. It all seems to be about me, my needs, my gifts, my talents, etc. More proof that the church of Jesus Christ has been transformed into the culture’s image with a few Bible verse thrown in.